Romanticism

Caspar David Friedrich: Wanderer Above a Sea of Fog (1818)

The romantic period is generally described as a movement that took place in Europe from 1770 to 1870.[1] The idea of Romanticism is a limitless philosophy that changed the way Europeans thought about themselves as individuals. Beginning in Germany and England, the movement was eventually expressed throughout Europe by people involved in many aspects of life including philosophy, political events, literature and the arts. While there are many ways to describe romanticism, there is no single way to define something that is considered unlimited.[2] For some, even the word ‘romantic’ has so many different meanings that, by itself, “it means nothing.”[3] Nevertheless, to begin to understand what the romantic idea is, one must first imagine what life was like before this time.

In the earlier centuries of the modern era, Europeans were limited by a ridged class structure that allowed a small privileged minority to set up standards for the rest of society. The reformation ideas and scientific revolution allowed people new choices and knowledge, however the earlier Enlightenment philosophers of the 18th century promoted the idea that logic and reason alone could lead society in the correct direction. The Enlightenment described nature as a soulless machine or something that could be explained with “mathematical certainty.”[4] They also promoted the idea that religion ultimately blocked human intelligence and thereby weakened the traditional foundations of spiritual philosophy.[5]

As a counter to the enlightenment reasoning, the later romantics considered imagination to be the most important creative ability and power. Human instincts, intuition, and emotions were highly regarded as natural guidance systems equal to the refined ideas of logic and reason.[6] These ideas promoted a freedom from the previous century, which opened the way for the conception of “creative genius.”[7] The Romantic view of life also was different from the enlightenment because it created a new view of nature as a living expression of beauty and as a mirror of the unexplainable infinite spiritual existence.[8]

In another sense, the romantics were also reacting to what they thought was wrong with their own society. The industrial revolution was rapidly changing the natural and social landscape of Europe in both positive and negative ways. As production of manufactured goods increased enormously, European countries began to dominate world commerce thereby increasing local economies. However, the situation was lopsided because it further distanced the rich from the poor and greatly increased poverty. As working and living conditions became more dismal for the working class, the natural environment was also negatively affected by an increase in urban areas and a decrease in natural resources. Ironically, as romantics responded to the coldness of the revolution, many also benefitted from it because the increased revenue allowed them to break from the traditional, established “rules” of art to risk trying spontaneous, original forms of expression.[9]

Ultimately, the Romantics tried to be constructive and creative and to “think, act, write, or paint” in new dynamic ways.[10] They were bold dreamers who expressed their ideas with a disregard for public opinion, while at the same time forging a new path for the expression of individuality. From the aspect of the study of philosophy, Romanticism was complex to say the least, but the diversity of ideas led to unique ways of thinking about the nature of the mind. There were many philosophers from this era including: Jean-Jacques Rousseau, Immanuel Kant, and Samuel Taylor Coleridge.

Romanticism in Philosophy

Jean-Jacques Rousseau

Jean-Jacques Rousseau was a Swiss philosopher who lived in several European communities from 1712-1778.[11] Rousseau was one of the most controversial figures of the 18th century. On one hand, he is described as destructive because he was followed by Robespierre and the revolution. On the other hand, he is portrayed as the “father of romanticism” and a genius who “knew more about politics and society than all the Enlighteners taken together.”[12] Rousseau is also viewed as a man who desired to make his, and future societies better by expressing the importance of nature and man’s individuality.

Examples of romanticism ideas are found in many of his works including Emile (1762), in which he argued that man has an “innate moral sense or conscience.”[13] In other words, he believed each individual human is born with the divine ability to distinguish right from wrong; this statement put him at odds with religions authorities who defined him as a deist. Also, in the introduction to his autobiography, The Confessions (1781), he showed his belief in the importance of individualism, the sense of passion, and the development of intuition:

I am forming an undertaking which has no precedent, and the execution of which will have no imitator whatsoever. I wish to show my fellows a man in all the truth of nature; and this man will be myself. Myself alone. I feel my heart and I know men. I am not made like any of the ones I have seen; I dare to believe that I am not made like any that exist. If I am worth no more, at least I am different. whether nature has done well or ill in breaking the mold in which it cast me, is something which cannot be judged until I have been read…Eternal Being, assemble around me the countless host of my fellows: let them listen to my confessions, let them shudder at my unworthiness, let them blush at my woes. Let each of them in his turn uncover his heart at the foot of Thy throne with the same sincerity; and then let a single one say to Thee, if he dares: “I was better than that man.” [14]

Immanuel Kant

Rousseau had great influence on another important philosopher, Immanuel Kant.[15] Known as one of the most important German philosophers, Immanuel Kant (1724-1804) was influenced from Locke, Hume, Rousseau, and others from the Enlightenment period. In relationship to the past, Rousseau and Kant could be explained as a bridge from one period to the next.[16] Kant wrote The Critique of Pure Reason in 1781 and years later Heinrich Heine, an important German romantic poet, remarked that the book started an “intellectual revolution in Germany” which was analogous to the French Revolution and also to the idea of the “reflective mind.”[17] This view of the mind was as creative, not passive, and that reason was not derived from experience.[18] His philosophy defined two different realms: science and value. Science was described as useful knowledge that dealt with the world of appearances. Value of moral and esthetic experience, was viewed as intuitive, and concerned the world of substantive reality. In Kant’s explanation, each of the realms was not perfected by the human mind. He believed the mind could get clear and useful knowledge from science, but knowledge of appearances only. He believed it was possible that man could realize ultimate truth from the spiritual realm, but in general, most could not reach that level of understanding. Kant also believed that science could not add anything to human values, therefore it had nothing to do with God. [19]

Samuel Taylor Coleridge

At the turn of the century, Romanticism began to pick up momentum. English authors such as William Wordsworth, Lord Byron, John Keats, and Samuel Taylor Coleridge were becoming famous for their contributions to literature. Coleridge was an important philosopher—poet who lived from 1772—1834.[20] An avid reader, Coleridge was influenced at a young age by popular fairy tales and classic books such as The Arabian Nights.[21] This harbored an enormous imagination which developed into a reputation as a dreamer and child of nature who was overburdened by the tedious responsibilities of life. His philosophical ideas eventually developed into a deep interest in spirituality as was shown in his definition of creativity—“a repetition in the finite mind of the eternal act of creation in the infinite I AM.”[22]

During his teenage and college years Coleridge became concerned with the political events including the French revolution, and social issues such as the slave trade. As he grew older, he suffered from physical and emotional pain and consequently became addicted to opium. Coleridge was under the influence of the drug when he created of one of his greatest poems, Kubla Khan, in 1816:
In Xanadu did Kubla Khan
A stately pleasure-dome decree:
Where Alph, the sacred river, ran
Through caverns measureless to man
Down to a sunless sea.
So twice five miles of fertile ground
With walls and towers were girdled round:
And there were gardens bright with sinuous rills,
Where blossomed many an incense-bearing tree;
And here were forests ancient as the hills,
Enfolding sunny spots of greenery...[23]

In support of the romantic reaction to the 18th century restrictions, Coleridge was also opposed to the thoughts of reason as the only authority of the mind. For instance, Essays Interposed for Amusement, Retrospect, and Preparation, Essay V(1818), he states:
... I must warn against an opposite error--namely, that if Reason, as distinguished from Prudence, consists merely in knowing that Black cannot be White--or when a man has a clear conception of an inclosed figure, and another equally clear conception of a straight line, his Reason teaches him that these two conceptions are incompatible in the same object, i.e. that two straight lines cannot include a space--the said Reason must be a very insignificant faculty...
Was it an insignificant thing to weigh the Planets, to determine all their courses, and prophecy every possible relation of the Heavens a thousand years hence? Yet all this mighty chain of science is nothing but a linking together of truths of the same kind, as, the whole is greater than its part:--or, if A and B = C, then A = B--or 3 + 4 = 7, therefore 7 + 5 = 12, and so forth. X is to be found either in A or B, or C. or D: It is not found in A, B, or C, therefore it is to be found in D.--What can be simpler? Apply this to an animal--a Dog misses his master where four roads meet--he has come up one, smells to two of the others, and then with his head aloft darts forward to the third road without any examination. If this was done by a conclusion, the Dog would have Reason--how comes it then, that he never shews it in his ordinary habits? Why does this story excite either wonder or incredulity?--If the story be a fact, and not a fiction, I should say--the Breeze brought his Master's scent down the fourth Road to the Dog's nose, and that therefore he did not put it down to the Road, as in the two former instances. So aweful and almost miraculous does the simple act of concluding, that take 3 from 4, there remains one, appear to us when attributed to the most sagacious of all animals. [24] ---concludes first section, by J. Klinge

Romanticism in politics

Romantic ideals appealed to both sides of political spectrum, and served to shape the ideals of every politician that was to follow. Conservatives saw it as an argument against the rationalism of the French Revolution and against national homogony that rejected regional variances. The Enlightenment values rejected localized customs, and sought a strictly rational worldview, with was often at odds with continued religious feeling, particularly amoung those in the country.[25] The old ways, and the sense of regional community they instilled, were seem as preferable by many to the self centered out for yourself that seemed to go hand in hand with free market capitalism. Conservatives feared that without the moral guidance of religion, human vices would expand unchecked, (a sentiment echoed by many modern conservatives,) and society would lose its ethical framework, degenerating into a selfish free for all. The more liberal drew inspiration from the greater individualism favoured by the Romantics, fighting for personal freedoms and individual growth, as well as the liberty to pursue individual economic options, rather than being tied down to the land and the feudal system. Liberals often objected to the strength of the Church, and sought a more personal vision in their religious leanings.

The Romantic philosophies were highly influential in the revolts across Europe. Its view of National identity made for new movement, Nationalism, which would sweep across both Europe and the New World. Whereas formerly kings had banded desperate ethnic groups together into kingdoms and empires, Nationalism led to idea that ethnic groups could and should create their own independent nations, an idea that remains common today. These ideals brought about revolts that swept across Europe like a firestorm, tearing apart kingdoms in the drive to remake them as nations. Ethnic groups that had long been subjugated under foreign powers grew to believe they had the right to self rule, and revolutions became almost commonplace. In France, the peasantry sought to throw away the rulers of the old regime, and create a new nation with greater personal freedoms. Greece and Belgium fought and succeeded in breaking free of foreign rulers, creating independent states that would rule themselves, rather than answering to the dictates of the Ottomans or the Netherlands, respectively. And the assorted states, baronies, principalities, cities and fiefdoms of central Europe and the Italian peninsula would being to se themselves as a people united by common language and culture, and banded together to form the nations of Italy and Germany.

France

Many of the writers on both sides of the French Revolution used Romantic imagery or language, but the new Republic had been founded on Enlightment principles, emphasised with the Declaration of the Rights of Man and the Citizen.[26] The simple, emotional words tended to appeal more to the common folk than the dry intellectualism of the Enlightenment, and helped to rally large numbers behind the cause of Revolution, or later, in reversing the excesses of the Terror. [27]Nationalism was a driving force behind the new Republic, with many people joining of a sense of patriotism, and it was that nationalism that allowed the French military to fill its ranks and hold off the many enemies, particularly Austria and Prussia, that would have preferred it to tumble. The Romantics strongly supported the Revolution in France until the Terror, after which many turned against it, supporting rise of Napoleon to counter the excesses of Revolution.

Napoleon continued many of the Romantic ideals, and particularly the conservatives supported him, as he promised a return to the older values they supported. Both the Revolutionaries and later Napoleon idealized the common folk, such as the Sans-Coulettes, which both gained the support of the majority of France, but also emphasized the Romantic fondness of the folk traditions. The post Revolution attitude in France that saw the Revolution as the failure of the Enlightenment ideals would bring great support for Romanticism.[28]

Greece

In Greece, the cradle of Western civilization had been ruled by the Ottoman sultans for centuries. The Ottomans and Greeks had few cultural similarities, the Muslim Turks cared little for the Christian Greeks, and Christians were denied full political rights under Muslim rule, being considered inferior subjects in the Ottoman Empire. The Greek Orthodox Church had helped keep Greek national identity alive under Ottomans, and the constant reminder of their so-called inferiority helped formulate dissent amoung the Greeks. Merchants of Greek heritage throughout Western Europe and in Russia began to call for an independent Greece, seeking the aid of European nations against the Ottoman rulers.[29] Many Greek merchants were educated in Western Europe, and from there they learned of the ideals of Nationalism, which they brought back to Greece in the form of books, pamphlets, and educational programs for the Greek people, a process that has been described as the Modern Greek Enlightenment. Groups of bandits also struck against Ottomans, they became something like Robin Hood figures and helped inspire resistance. Later, when Greece rose in open revolt, they formed the beginnings of Greek Army. Greece also drew on its strong maritime tradition, (which had helped supply its mercantile wealth,) and Greek pirates began to prey on Ottoman ships in irregular naval actions.

By 1821, the Greek War of Independence had begun, with the majority of Greeks rising against the Ottomans, using their shared Christianity as a rallying point, aided in large part by the organization of the Greek Orthodox Church. As time went on international opinion began to strongly favour the Greeks, particularly after a number of Turkish atrocities came to light. (That the Greeks countered with equally vile acts was generally ignored by the European press.) In England, France and Russia the popular opinion strongly favoured military intervention on behalf of Greece, and many private citizens sought to drum up support for Greece. There was a large amount of Romantic themed literature and poetry that came out of Greece at this time, and it was very popular throughout Europe. The most famous of these poets was the Lord Byron, and Englishman, who died in Greece while trying to organize money, supplies, and naval support for the Greeks. His words were widely read in Europe, and his death also helped raise European support of the Greek revolution.[30]

The mountains look on Marathon --
And Marathon looks on the sea;
And musing there an hour alone,
I dream'd that Greece might yet be free
Byron “The Isles Of Greece” [31]

In 1827 the Treaty of London brought the English, French, and Russians into the war.[32] These great powers mainly sent naval support, seeking more to force a peace than to get involved in the war, but an incident with a Turkish ship opening fire on the French flagship lead to the Battle of Navarino, which decimated the Turkish fleet. On land, the Greek army, finally trained to the standards of a modern army, defeated a large Turkish force, leading to the Turks finally agreeing to treaty terms. The Kingdom of Greece was established, backed by Britain, France, and Russia, and the Ottoman Empire took its first major step along its decline. Nationalism was given a serious boost, as the Greeks had demonstrated that successful revolution was possible, aided by Romantic art and literature.

Belgium

In the southern part of the United Kingdom of the Netherlands, French speakers sought to be free of Dutch control, and hoped to establish their own culturally distinct nation. The Dutch had long dominated the Kingdom, as the king was a Dutch Protestant. The Belgian people were mainly French speaking, as well as predominantly Catholic, and felt ignored and abused by their rulers. Legally, the king’s successor could not be a Catholic, and the Belgians felt they would continue to get an unfair deal from a Protestant ruler. Most of the political decisions tended to favour the North, and both groups had an equal number of representatives in the States General, despite the larger population in the south. They also opposed the free market policies preferred by the Dutch merchant class, it allowed for cheaper imports with hurt the economy of the mostly agrarian Belgians. There were unpopular attempts at linguistic reform, seeking to expand requirements of Dutch as the official language.

A series of 1830 riots expanded when the Dutch king William I sent troops to quell the unrest, leading to street fighting in Brussels, and later to the enraged southerners to form a Congress and draw up a declaration for their independence. After a short conflict between the two sides, (broken up by the threat of a French army) the Treaty of London was signed by all the European powers, including the Netherlands, recognizing the existence of the Kingdom of Belgium in 1839, though the separation had been fact in all but name since 1831.

Germany

Romanticism was key in inspiring the idea of a unified “Germany” not just a collection of small kingdoms and principalities. Much of German nationalism grew out of the Napoleonic Wars. The German states had suffered common mistreatment under the conqueror Napoleon. They shared a common bond through their resistance to the French Empire, and the later victories of the Allies against France added to a sense of national pride. Also, the practical matter that individually, each state was too small to effect the global stage, and could easily fall prey to a larger conquering power, as had just been proven, made unification seem like a more attractive prospect. Also, the rise of Romantic literature and music influenced a new sense of German-nests, emphasizing the cultural similarities shared by the German people. The Brothers Grimm and their folk tales, (which will be discussed in more detail later,) as well as German language music, and operas reflecting German stories and themes, helped speak for cultural unity.[33] The growth of literacy made these tales, as well as the more intellectual writings in favour of a German nation; reach more and more of the common people.

In 1848, the German Confederation, which had formed as a loose group after the Napoleonic Wars, called a Federal Assembly, and sought to strengthen its members connections. The German Confederation was kept weak by the feuding of the Austrians and the Prussians, who each feared the other gaining in strength and seeking to dominate central Europe. This was soon disbanded by the Austrians. There were a series of attempted revolutions, and in 1866, the North Germany Confederation, lead by the Prussians, dissolved the old German Confederation and sought to create a Germany free of the influence of Austria.[34] The Prussians would first go to war against the Austrians, seizing control of large portions of central Europe, where earlier they had taken a large role in organizing transportation and economic links between the smaller German states, which made German Unification much more efficient. Continued patriotic songs, poetry, and literature made for tighter connections, effectively squeezing out the Austrians, who continued to try to maintain the old style, multicultural Empire. The war gave the Prussians great power, and in 1871, the majority of the remaining Germanic states chose to join the North Germany Confederation, forming the German Empire, which would rule until the end of the First World War.

Italy

Like Germany, Italy also fell victim to Napoleon, though they were not as instrumental in resisting him, they banded together in the wake of the French Empire. After the Napoleonic wars, the Italian states were mostly ruled/influenced by Austria, though one Italian did attempt to gain Austrian support for a unified Kingdom of Italy. Both Austria and the Pope opposed unification, the Austrians feared a strong aggressive neighbor to their south (with good reason, the Italians would aid Prussian in its war against Austria in 1866,) and the Pope feared the loss of the Papal States, a source of Papal influence and financial support. Strong artistic and literary movements supported the idea of unification, and several secret societies sprang up to act toward unification, though sometimes using means such as assassination, they did not always enjoy popular support. A series of small insurrections, revolts, and full out wars began to arise all along the Italian peninsula, starting in 1820s. The sense of Italian nationalism grew, though the nature of the unified government was a source of frequent dispute, with everything from a king to a congress to Papal control having advocates. The Papal States suffered early and more successful revolts, as the Pope lacked the military force to suppress the revolutionaries. Though the Pope did seek, and receive, outside assistance, it was another nail in the coffin of Papal authority. Also, boycotts in Austrian controlled areas sought to deny the Austrians tax money from Italian areas.

With some early aid by French troops, the Italians were successful in driving out the Austrians, and unifying the nation as the Kingdom of Italy, with the exception of Rome and Venice. The Pope still controlled the city of Rome, and sought to maintain his power there, and with the support of Catholics worldwide, the Italian armies were reluctant to attack, particularly as the Pope had enlisted French aid himself. An agreement between the new Italian government and the French lead to the withdrawal of the troops. Italian support for Prussians war against Austria allowed them to seize the Austrian controlled city of Venice, (aided by a rigged vote that showed Venetian support for the Kingdom of Italy,) and Italian troops marched into Rome, facing token resistance only, in 1870.[35] The Pope was allowed to keep the Vatican. The state of modern Italy was not fully unified until after the First World War, then the last remaining states, Italian in all but name, joined.

The Romantic Movement, and Nationalism, its offshoot, almost completely redrew the map of Europe, giving us the nations we see today. It also brought about increased violence, as men and women saw it necessary to kill and die in defense of their ideal nation. It has lead to the creation of new countries the world wide, not just in Europe, and created a force the allows for patriotism to bind those countries together, creating stable governments that are more difficult to topple, and, as the fall of the Berlin Wall have shown, are difficult to break apart.
---concludes second section, by J.P. Krause

Romanticism in German Literature

Sturm und Drang

Romanticism was largely a movement characterized by its popularity in literature. Before 1806, the Holy Roman Empire had been an earlier setting for a few seeds of this movement to take form. The writings of Johann Wolfgang Goethe and Friedrich Schiller in Weimar characterized the Sturm und Drang movement among a select group of literary figures from the 1760s-1780s. This movement is also referenced as a preliminary stage of Weimar Classicism, where Goethe and Schiller often had expressed the extremities of emotion and individualism as a backlash to the rationalism of the Enlightenment. Great poems like Goethe’s Prometheus reflected a ponderous message to his audience, describing defiance to authority.[37] Therefore, the writing of this period conveyed a very political message commanding mankind to be generous, diligent, and to judge the good from the bad, such as the significance in Goethe’s Das Göttliche. [38] This early movement always portrayed a varied style of theism and commonly had a negative appeal for nature. These trends laid the background for the development of major literary themes from 1798-1835, where German Romanticism was at its apogee.

Prometheus
(first stanza)
Cover your sky, Zeus,
With Cloudy Vapor!
And, like a boy
Who beheads thistles,
Practice on oaks and mountain heights!
You never the less must
Let my earth remain,
And my hut, which you did not build,
And my hearth,
For whose fire
You envy me.

(last stanza)
Here I sit and form people
In my image,
A race that shall be like me,
To suffer, to weep,
To enjoy and to be happy-
And to pay you no mind,
Like me!

German Romanticism

Romantic literature of the early nineteenth century borrowed many themes from the Sturm und Drang movement, but also affirmed a new style of its own. The imagination had become one of the primary sources for authors to utilize along with an apparent nostalgia for medievalism. This worship of the Middle Ages, especially for the German speaking world introduced many gothic elements characterized by evil, death, darkness, magic, and exotic writing. The Gothicism was developed from earlier works like Goethe’s, who often maintained the protagonist in his writings to be driven by revenge, leading to violence. However, instead of a poor outlook on the environment, romantic figures of this period shed a more favorable light on the idealized natural world. Poems and novels such as Joseph Freiherr von Eichendorff’s Mondnacht and Ludwig Tieck’s Der Blonde Eckbert are examples of this beautification of nature and passion for isolation in typically forested areas. Not surprisingly, Eichendorff, penned for the first time the word ‘waldeinsamkeit’ describing exactly this romantic relationship to the forests of Germany. [39]

88-7754-958-0.jpg

Mondnacht

2480M.jpg

It was as if the sky
Had silently kissed the Earth
So that she, in the glimmer of blossoms,
Now had to dream of him.

The breeze passed through the fields,
The ears of grain waved gently,
The forests rustled softly,
So starry-clear was the night.

And my soul spread
Its wings out wide,
And flew through the silent regions
As if it were flying home.

Religious Literature

This movement also retained the metaphysical component of Weimar Classicism. The supernatural element in poems and novels were commonly intertwined with the praise for a godly figure. This optimistic outlook on religion was a literary medium for romantic spiritualist to express an inner faith for god in opposition to the scientific rationalists and philosophers of the time. The ideas of supported by Immanuel Kant in German Idealism were one of the key factors in this literary style. Kant’s idealism contained strong notions for individual self-reflection as one experiences and understands the world around them, retaining a soulful passion for faith in God. [40] Some of the more prominent romantic philosophers included Johann Gottfried Herder, Friedrich Daniel Ernst Schleiermacher, and Karl Wilhelm Friedrich von Schlegel. They utilized human sympathy to express how individual emotions play a role in personal faith, belief, and understanding in the divine spirit. They also drew inspiration from their learned backgrounds in theology. Together, their writings formed one side of a great scholarly debate against atheism and deism throughout the nineteenth century.

Romantic Literary Schools in German Lands

The currents of romantic literature dwelled within small circles of prominent authors, commonly called schools. These were common throughout the German principalities where schools formed around universities near Jena and Heidelberg. Travel had become a major aspect of a romantic author’s life, allowing them to permeate their ideas throughout major cities, and creating cultural centers for romantic ideals. Johann Gottlieb Fichte, Friedrich Schilling, George Wilhelm Hegel, and the Schlegel Brothers congregated to the center described as the “Jenaer Romantik”, while Tieck, Novalis, Heinrich von Kleist, and Friedrich Hoelderin formed the Heidelberg school. [41]

Authors who created these schools were responding to the contemporary situation in which they lived. Many writers saw a delusion with the ideals of the enlightenment and capitalist development, which had tremendous effects on everyday society, culture, and politics. Subsequently, there literature was a tool to escape the boundaries of industrialism, urban development, and population growth. They channeled their ideas to their writing, suggesting a return to the simplistic, humble origins of everyday life. This writing was uniquely nationalistic in all of its many facets.

Romantic Literature and Nationalism

The writing in a common German vernacular helped strengthen the imagined boundaries of a Germany yet to be unified. Works on grammar and word origins from linguists such as the Brothers Grimm helped to standardized the modern German language. Jacob and Wilhelm Grimm were also influential in collecting, researching, and disseminating various types of folklore akin to only German peoples. These oral histories included: fairytales, jokes, riddles, songs, rhymes, legends, myths, and household tales. Transcribing these oral histories to a new field of literature was very political in its nationalistic ideals. A culture was expressed about a specific group of people whose traditions, histories, and myths invoked a sense of national pride previously nonexistent. [42] In 1806, the German poet Fichte coined the term Volkstum for the first time, which translates to “nationality”. This was expressed to the German ‘nation’ for resistance to Napoleon.

Romanticism had significantly been developed as a movement in writing throughout the Germanic lands, but had also spread to other nations. Writers in western European countries as well as the United States developed their own unique styles of romantic literature. In England for example, the imagination of Mary Shelley helped to produce the classic, Frankenstein, while in America Edgar Allen Poe and James Fennimore Cooper expressed the romantic sentiment with a variety of works. Other works had very nationalistic tenants as well, and like German writing, slowly immersed itself into the realm of art and music. This is important to understand in considering one of essential reasons for the rise in nationalism before the dawn of the First World War. People tend to take pride in the accomplishments of their country. The fruitions of literatary classics ventilate this type of elated awareness, and from the research of Richard Merritt, history can ascertain that newspapers of the nineteenth-century tend to reflect this emotion with select wording concerning national pride. [43]
---concludes third section, by A. Bonikowske

Romanticism in the Visual Arts

Romanticism had a major influence on the art of early nineteenth century Europe. Romantics believed that feeling and imagination were crucial to the human experience, which made art well suited for expressing romantic ideas. Painting was especially ideal, because unlike sculpture and architecture, painting allowed artists to capture fleeting emotions or capitalize on sudden bursts of inspiration [44]. The works of John Constable, Joseph M.W. Turner, Eugene Delacroix and other painters of this period embody the appreciation for nature, spirituality, emotion, and individual freedom that defined the Romantic movement.

In many ways, the Romantic movement in art was a reaction against the neoclassical style that had dominated European artistic fashion in the eighteenth century. Neoclassical artists like Jacques-Louis David drew inspiration from the architecture, sculpture, and mythology of classical Greek and Roman civilization. Eighteenth century artists sought to imitate the bold lines, grac

Goya: The Third of May 1808 (1814)

eful symmetry, and simple grandeur that they saw in ancient art, in part because this style matched the Enlightenment's emphasis on order and rationality. Romantic painters rebelled against the confines of this order, defying neoclassical conformity with new displays of energy, emotion, and color [45].

The work of Spanish painter and printmaker Fransisco Goya exemplifies the disillusionment that romantics felt towards the ideals of the Enlightenment. The Third of May 1808, perhaps Goya's most famous painting, depicts the execution of Spanish rebels who had revolted against French occupation during the Napoleonic Wars. Napoleon had justified his military expansion across Europe with enlightenment rhetoric, casting himself as a liberator fighting against feudal tyranny. Goya forcefully rejected that notion in this painting, which shows a well-ordered row of uniformed soldiers firing at a fearful and broken band of accused rebels. As viewed from The Third of May 1808, Napoleon's legacy was one of violent oppression rather than liberation. The style of the painting was as rebellious as its subject. Rather than staging a noble scene to make classical heroes of the rebels, Goya emphasized the dark emotional immediacy of execution [46].

As classical themes fell out of favor among artists, Romantics began to paint new subjects, especially nature. In Northern Europe, landscape painting became the domi

Constable: Stour Valley and Dedham Church (1814)

nant artistic fashion of the early nineteenth century. John Constable was among the most renowned British landscape painters of this period, and nearly all of his major works depict the countryside near his home in the Stour Valley of Suffolk, England, a place to which he felt a deep emotional attachment [47]. His quiet paintings of fields and trees with no narrative subject, like Stour Valley and Dedham Church, were a major departure from neoclassical sensibilities, to the extent that the Royal Academy rejected another of his now celebrated paintings as "a nasty green thing" in part because it lacked the polished form and mythical figures typical of neoclassical artwork [48]. Constable did aim for realism in his painting, however. Indeed, he sought to paint landscapes with scientific attention to their true details, in part because he revered nature as a spiritual force that could be understood through observation and contemplation. To Constable, nature was imbued with morality that could be illustra

Turner: Snowstorm (1842)

ted by scenes of people and nature together in harmony — a strong contrast to the industrialization that was then transforming Britain [49].

Joseph M.W. Turner was the other major British landscape artist of the early nineteenth century. In many ways, he was opposite to Constable. Turner did not seek to make realistic depictions of natural scenes in his paintings, but instead sought to imaginatively depict the forces of nature [50]. Although Turner sometimes based paintings on observation, his goal was not to replicate scenes but rather to record his experience. To make one painting, Snowstorm - Steam Boat off a Harbor's Mouth, Turner claimed "I got the sailors to lash me to the mast to observe it. I

Turner: Norham Castle Sunrise (1845)

was lashed for four hours and did not expect to escape, but I felt bound to record it" [51]. The resulting image is not meant to capture what Turner really saw, but rather what he felt.

Turner's best remembered paintings lack clear lines or focused shapes, but they make dramatic use of color and light to illustrate the energy of nature. The resulting work is often intensely emotional, for Turner's aim was to overwhelm viewers with the enormous power of nature. Not all of Turner's paintings were stormy and violent, however. In Norham Castle Sunrise, for instance, he captured the serene power of sun and mist to flood the earth with light at daybreak, in a scene that romantically defies any attempt at order or rationality.

Friedrich: Winter Landscape with Church (1811)

Caspar David Friedrich was a leader in German landscape painting during the Romantic Era. His paintings often emphasized the timeless spiritual elements of nature in contrast to human mortality. He painted many subjects shrouded in snow or mist, and whereas neoclassical painters had created scenes full of Greek or Roman grandeur, Friedrich was fascinated with the ruins of medieval churches, monasteries, and burial sites. In Winter Landscape with Church, Friedrich depicted a crippled traveller who cast aside his crutches to pray at a crucifix in a grove of fir trees. The spires of a cathedral rise from the mist in the background, but they are mirrored and overwhelmed by the trees, and it is at their base, rather than at the church, that the traveller seems to have encountered God [52]. Through this and his many similar paintings, Friedrich sought to demonstrate the divinity he saw in nature.

Not all Romantic art consisted of lan

Delacroix: Liberty Leading the People (1830)

dscape painting. In France especially, classical narrative paintings endured through the Romantic period, but the enlightenment value of orderly simplicity was replaced by an emphasis on chaos, destruction, exoticism, and mortality. Eugène Delacroix was the quintessential French romantic painter, and gained fame from a number of paintings of devastating scenes from history and mythology. In one mural to decorate the Palais Bourbon Library, Delacroix went so far as to paint a scene of the destruction of classical civilization by Attila the Hun [53]. Another of Delacroix's painting, Liberty Leading the People, is unusual for being one of Delacroix's only paintings of a contemporary event. It shows a romanticized scene from the French Revolution of 1830, depicting people across a spectrum of different classes fight together for their nation and their liberty. The female figure who leads them is a symbol of liberty, but unlike neoclassical images that depicted this symbol as a goddess on a pedestal, Delacroix depicted her as a real woman, dirty and amongst the ordinary people.

Romanticism in Music

Romanticism had a tremendous influence on European art music, to the extent that many musicologists extend the Romantic period in music up to the early twentieth century, long after Romanticism had been supplanted by other styles in the visual and literary arts. As in the visual arts, music in Europe immediately preceding the nineteenth century had been dominated by the neoclassicism of the Enlightenment, which meant combining simple rhythms, pleasing harmonies, and clear melodies in a logical and orderly composition. In the nineteenth century, Romantics sought to show their creative individuality by defying classical forms to create music that would stir emotion rather than intellect, whether through contemplative melancholy or dramatic excitement [54].

Music historians usually point to Ludwig van Beethoven when marking the divide between the neoclassical and romantic periods. Beethoven schooled under classical composers and composed his early works in line with classical traditions, but as his career progressed, he turned to increasingly inventive and romantic forms. His work therefore represents both a culmination of classical traditions and the birth of a new paradigm that steered the work of a century of subsequent composers from Mendelssohn and Chopin to Brahms and Dvořák [55].

Beethoven's music embodied a wide range of romantic ideals. His Third Symphony, titled "Eroica," ushered in a new era of dramatically stirring music, the opera Fidelio contained an ode to freedom, and the Ninth Symphony concluded in the famous "Ode to Joy." The romantic ideal that pervaded all of Beethoven's work was his commitment to individuality and imagination, for Beethoven constantly sought to innovate amid great personal challenges, including the onset of his own deafness.

The Fourth Piano Concerto in G major is a particularly good example of Beethoven's romantic individuality. Classical Piano Concertos began with an orchestral passage, which a solo pianist would subsequently join and complement. In Beethoven's Fourth Piano Concerto, however, the first notes are struck by the solo pianist, who is then followed by the orchestra. The contrast between the soloist and the larger instrumental section becomes even more pronounced in the second movement of the piece, when the orchestra plays a harsh unison that the piano soloist refuses to join, and instead the soloist plays an entirely different melody that is serene and contemplative, asserting an individual will apart from the other players [56]. In much the same way, Beethoven's original music set him apart from other composers, and demonstrated his capacity as one individual who could transform the musical world.

Another of Beethoven's most romantic pieces was the Sixth Symphony, entitled "Pastoral." Much like Romantic poetry and landscape painting, this symphony was intended to evoke images of nature and folk life. Its movements bore titles including "Thunderstorm," "Scene by the Brook," and "Merry Gathering of Country Folk." Later Romantics composers further extended the appreciation of folk tradition by actually borrowing folk melodies in their compositions, as Johannes Brahms did for his Hungarian Dances. These folk-inspired compositions were part of a broader nationalist sentiment in Romantic-era music that reached its height with composers like the Antonin Dvořák, whose major compositions ran thick with the musical traditions of his native Czechoslovakia, and Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky, whose 1812 Overture was a resounding assertion of Russian national pride [57].

Legacy of Romanticism

Romanticism had a profound influence on the culture of Europe in the nineteenth century and beyond. Although Romantics were not united by a single set of unwavering beliefs, they shared a set of attitudes that emphasized the importance of emotion, nature, spirituality, folk tradition, and individualism. In a time of major social change brought by the liberalization of governments and the growth of industrial capitalism, Romanticism provided Europeans continuity with the past and gave value to the mystical aspects of life that other movements squelched or ignored, asserting the importance of experience and sensation as well as logic and reason. At the same time, Romanticism led philosophers, writers, artists, and musicians to explore entirely new ideas and propelled them towards Impressionism, Modernism and even more pronounced expressions of creative originality that defied conventional order. To some extent, the legacy of Romanticism endures today in the value that western society continues to place on sensation, imagination, and individual expression.
---concludes fourth section, by J. Wachuta

Endnotes

1. Romanticism: Introduction to Romanticism http://academic.brooklyn.cuny.edu/english/melani/cs6/rom.html [accessed 10/20/2009]
2. Furst, Lilian. Romanticism (Norfolk: Cox and Wyman Ltd., 1969), 1.
3. Stromberg, Roland. European Intellectual History since 1789 (New York: Meredith Corporation, 1968), 32.
4. The History Guide, Lectures on Modern European Intellectual History, Lecture 16: The Romantic Era. http://www.historyguide.org/intellect/lecture16a.html [accessed 10/31/2009]
5. IBID
6. Romanticism: http://wsu.edu:8080/~brians/hum_303/romanticism.html [accessed 10/20/2009]
7. Stromberg, Roland. European Intellectual History since 1789 (New York: Meredith Corporation, 1968), 40.
8. Romanticism: Introduction to Romanticism http://academic.brooklyn.cuny.edu/english/melani/cs6/rom.html [accessed 10/20/2009]
9. The History Guide, Lectures on Modern European Intellectual History, Lecture 16: The Romantic Era. http://www.historyguide.org/intellect/lecture16a.html [accessed 10/31/2009]
10. Barzun, Jacques. Romanticism and the Modern Ego (Boston: Little, Brown and Company, 1944), 22.
11. Stromberg, Roland. European Intellectual History since 1789 (New York: Meredith Corporation, 1968), 297.
12. Barzun, Jacques. Romanticism and the Modern Ego (Boston: Little, Brown and Company, 1944), 31.
13. Christopher John Murray, general editor, Encyclopedia of the Romantic Era, 1760-1850 Volume 2 Fitzroy Dearborn, (New York: Fitzroy Dearborn, 2004), 965.
14. Jean-Jacques Rousseau, The Confessions and Correspondence, Including the Letters to Malesherbes, Edited by Christopher Kelly, Roger D. Masters, and Peter G. Stillman, Translated by Christopher Kelly (Hanover: University Press of New England, 1995), 5.
15. Christopher John Murray, general editor, Encyclopedia of the Romantic Era, 1760-1850 Volume 2 Fitzroy Dearborn, (New York: Fitzroy Dearborn, 2004), 965.
16. Stromberg, Roland. European Intellectual History since 1789 (New York: Meredith Corporation, 1968), 8.
17. IBID, 7.
18. IBID, 22.
19. IBID, 23.
20. Christopher John Murray, general editor, Encyclopedia of the Romantic Era, 1760-1850 Volume 1 Fitzroy Dearborn, (New York: Fitzroy Dearborn, 2004), 201.
21. IBID, 201.
22. Lisa Low, and Anthony Harding, eds., Milton, the metaphysicals, and romanticism. (New York, Cambridge University Press, 1994), 23.
23. Romanticism: http://wsu.edu:8080/~brians/hum_303/romanticism.html [accessed 10/20/2009]
24. Electronic Text Center: Samuel Taylor Coleridge—Excerpts from the Friend. http://etext.virginia.edu/stc/Coleridge/phil_theo/Friend.html#feelings [accessed 11/19/2009]25. Talmon,J.L.. Romanticism and Revolt: Europe 1815-1848. Harcourt Brace and World, Inc. 1967.12.
26. Doyle,William. The Origins of the French Revolution. New York, Oxford University Press, 1980. 204.
27. Duff, David. Romance and Revolution. Cambridge University Press. 1994 9.
28. Andress, David. French Society in Revolution, 1789-1799. New York, Manchester University Press, 1999. 164.
29. Talmon, 110.
30. Duff, 123.
31. Quiller-Couch, on http://www.bartleby.com/
32. Talmon, 114.
33. Fulbrook, Mary. A Concise History of Germany. Cambridge University Press, 1991. 93.
34. Turk, Eleanor L. The History of Germany. Westport, CN, Greenwood Press. 1999.94.

37. Stanley Appelbaum, ed. and trans. by, Great Poems of the Romantic Era: A Dual-Language Book, 131 poems by Hölderin, Novalis, Eichendorff, Heine, Mörike and 18 other poets (New York: Dover Publications, 1995) xiii, 4-8.
38 Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, Das Göttliche, 1783. (Handout in German Course 420-001, instructed by Professor Dean Stroud, University of Wisconsin- La Crosse, 11-17-09)
39 Ludwig Tieck, Der Blonde Eckbert, bearbeitet von Achim Seiffarth (Hamburg: Cideb Editrice, 2003) 21. Joseph Freiherr von Eichendorff,
Mondnacht in Maria Cristina Berger and Maddalena Martini, Generation E: Deutschsprachige Landeskunde im europäischen Kontext (Genua: CIDEB Editrice, 2005) 116.
40 Marshall Brown, The Shape of German Romanticism (London: Cornell University Press, 1979) 130-132.
41 Walter Silz, Early German Romanticism: Its Founders and Heinrich Von Kleist (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1929) 54-59. Glyn Tegai Hughes, Romantic German Literature (New York: Holmes and Meier Publishers, 1979) 79.
42 Stanely Appelbaum, ed. and trans. by, Selected Folktales, Jacob & Wilhelm Grimm: A Dual Language Book (Meneola: Dover Publications, 2003) v-xi.
43 Anna Green and Kathleen Troup, The Houses of History: A critical reader in twentieth-century history and theory (New York: New York University Press, 1999) 147.
44. H. W., Janson, Penelope J. E. Davies, and others, Janson's History of Art: The Western Tradition, 7th ed., (Upper Saddle River, N.J.: Pearson Prentice Hall, 2007), 825.
45. Kenneth Clark, The Romantic Rebellion: Romantic versus Classic Art (London: John Murray; Sotheby Parke Bernet, 1973), 20.
46. Clark, 87-88
47. H. W., Janson, Penelope J. E. Davies, and others, 829.
48. Ronald Rees, "Constable, Turner, and Views of Nature in the Nineteenth Century," Geographical Review 72 no. 3 (July 1982), 256.
49. Rees, 260-261.
50. Rees, 263.
51. Clark, 243.
52. Joseph Koerner, Caspar David Friedrich and the Subject of Landscape, (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1990),18-19.
53. Clark, 216.
54. Rey Longyear, Nineteenth Century Romanticism in Music, 3rd ed, (Englewood Cliffs, N.J.: Prentice Hall, 1988), 6-10.
55. Longyear, 52-54.
56. Thomas May, "The Consecration of the House" [Program Notes for 'Hélène Grimaud, piano, plays Beethoven'], The Kennedy Center, http://www.kennedy-center.org/calendar/?fuseaction=composition&composition_id=4169 [accessed November 20, 2009].
57. Longyear, 224-234.

Annotated Bibliography

Andress, David. French Society in Revolution, 1789-1799. New York, Manchester University Press, 1999. Covering just the few years of the early French Revolution, was not terribly helpful for explaining the fallout, though it did include some primary works, including the writings of the time.

Applebaum, Stanley. ed. and trans. by. Great Poems of the Romantic Era: A Dual Language Book, 131 Poems by Hoelderin, Novalis, Eichendorff, Heine, Moerike and 18 other poets. New York: Dover Publications, 1995. This book offers several poems as primary sources in both German and English. The writing ranges from the Sturm und Drang movement affiliated with Goethe and Schiller, to later trends in German Romanticism in the closing nineteenth century. Brief analysis is given to select poems in the introduction.

Applebaum, Stanley. ed. and trans. by. Selected Folktales, Jacob & Wilhelm Grimm: A Dual Language Book. Meneoloa: Dover Publications, 2003. Selected translations of German household fairytales are given by Applebaum from the Grimm's original collection. The introduction provides background information on the Grimm's and brief history of each fairytale.

Ausmus, Harry, “Bernard M. G. Reardon.” American Historical Review Volume 91 Issue 5 (December 1986): page 1185-1186. The article reviews Bernard Reardon’s book Religion in the Age of Romanticism: Studies in Early Nineteenth-Century Thought. Ausmus identifies Reardon’s argument that the Romantics were not opposed to the use of reason, but rather were opposed to the narrow use of the term by the philosophes.

Barzun, Jacques. Romanticism and the Modern Ego. Boston: Little, Brown and Company, 1944. Barzun addressed the negative issues which were being linked to Romanticism during his lifetime. His argument questioned the validity of traditional views that connected some of the Romantics with 20th century fascism.

Brown, Marshall. The Shape of German Romanticism. London: Cornell University Press, 1979. Brown's monograph was adapted to not only describe the fundamentals of German Romantic Literature, but the philosophy and theology behind them as well.

Berger, Maria Cristina and Maddalena Martini. Generation E: Deutschsprachige Landeskunde im europaeischen Kontext. Genua: Cedeb Editrice, 2005. This an advanced educational text/workbook for learning the German language and culture in the context of European historical trends and themes. A small section of it offers primary examples of German Romanticism.

Clark, Kenneth. The Romantic Rebellion: Romantic versus Classic Art. London, England: John Murray; Sotheby Parke Bernet, 1973.
Sir Kenneth Clark was a director of the National Gallery in London and a leading British public intellectual and art historian. In this monograph, he argues that Romanticism in the visual arts represented a rebellion against the "static conformity" of classicism. Each chapter focuses on an individual artist, including Goya, Constable, Turner, and Delacroix and others, in demonstrating how their work represented a transformation or rejection of neoclassical ideals, and an assertion of Romantic attitudes. This title contains several prints of the artwork under discussion, including some in color.

Doyle, William. The Origins of the French Revolution. New York, Oxford University Press, 1980. A good work, covers in detail the social and ideological conditions leading up to the Revolution, including the influences of Nationalism.

Duff, David. Romance and Revolution. Cambridge University Press. 1994. Emphasizes the poetry of the Romantic persiod, particularly Shelly, but with useful excepts from a variety of writers.

Electronic Text Center: Samuel Taylor Coleridge—Excerpts from the Friend. http://etext.virginia.edu/stc/Coleridge/phil_theo/Friend.html#feelings [accessed 11/19/2009] Several writings from Coleridge’s publication of the metaphysical newspaper called the Friend.

Fulbrook, Mary. A Concise History of Germany. Cambridge University Press, 1991. Provides a basic overview of the history of Germany, including its formation and the politics behind the unification of modern Germany.

Furst, Lilian. Romanticism. Norfolk: Cox and Wyman Ltd., 1969. A short study designed to help describe the broad ideas of the Romantic literary movement.

Green, Anna and Kathleen Troup. The Houses of History: A Critical Reader in twentieth-century history and theory. New York: New York University Press, 1999. This book has been a useful text in all historical methods courses across the country. It contains the various schools of historical thought, their individual historiographical development, as well as selected primary sources for analysis.

Goethe, Johann Wolfgang von. Das Goettliche, 1783. Handout in German Course 420-001, instructed by Dean Stround of the University of La Crosse Department of Modern Languages, 11-17-09. The titel, roughly translated, means "On The Divine" or simply "The Divine" and conveys a very political message surrounding the abilities of mankind to discern right from wrong, creating a race of benevolent people, worthy of reflecting the gods.

History Guide, Lectures on Modern European Intellectual History, Lecture 16: The Romantic Era. http://www.historyguide.org/intellect/lecture16a.html [accessed 10/31/2009] An introduction to concepts of Romanticism focused mainly on its relationship with the Enlightenment age.

Hughes, Glyn Tegai. Romantic German Literature. New York: Holmes and Meier Publishers, 1979. This monograph is a well rounded introduction to all the tenets behind the German Romantic Movement. It also provides substantial background to direct any specific research by providing a list of sources for key topics of the movement.

Janson, H. W., Penelope J. E. Davies, et al. Janson's History of Art: The Western Tradition, 7th ed. Upper Saddle River, N.J.: Pearson Prentice Hall, 2007.
This reference work features a broad chronological narrative of western art history from the stone age to the twenty-first century, with abundant color illustrations. It includes a detailed chapter on Romanticism with descriptions of the major artists and works of the Romantic movement. The broad historical perspective provided by this text also makes it possible to study the historical roots of Romanticism in earlier periods, and the influence of Romanticism on subsequent movements.

Koerner, Joseph L. Caspar David Friedrich and the Subject of Landscape. New Haven: Yale University Press, 1990.
In this monograph, Joseph Koerner provides a detailed study of the landscape painting of the German Romantic artist Caspar David Friedrich. The book contains detailed descriptions of Friedrich's paintings alongside color prints, as well as an overview of Friedrich's appproach towards painting, nature, spirituality, and Romanticism.

Longyear, Rey M. Nineteenth Century Romanticism in Music, 3rd ed. Englewood Cliffs, N.J.: Prentice Hall, 1988.
This monograph provides an general overview of the Romantic movement in music. It begins with a discussion of the definition of romanticism in music, and includes biographies of major nineteenth century Romantic composers, linking together their shared influences in thematic sections on musical form and content. The book concludes with a discussion of the audiences to whom romantic music appealed.

Low, Lisa and Anthony Harding, eds. Milton, the metaphysicals, and romanticism. Cambridge University Press, 1994. Using the lens of current ideas such as cultural materialism, new historicism, and feminism, this study of Romanticism uses the past as a mirror to understand the present.

May, Thomas. "The Consecration of the House" [Program Notes for 'Hélène Grimaud, piano, plays Beethoven']. The Kennedy Center. http://www.kennedy-center.org/calendar/?fuseaction=composition&composition_id=4169 [accessed November 20, 2009].
This web page, first produced to accompany a concert performance of Beethoven's works in 2008, includes a description and analysis of three musical pieces including Beethoven's Fourth Piano Concerto. The author points out the originality of the concerto's form, and comments on the novel tension that the piece creates between the orchestra and the solo player.

Makdisi, Saree, Romantic Imperialism. Cambridge University Press, 1998. An excellent secondary source, that includes primary works and how they influenced the politics of the time, particularly the growth of the British and French Empires. It also speaks of non-European viewpoints, which were not useful for the task at hand.

Murray, Christopher, general ed. Encyclopedia of the Romantic Era, 1760-1850 Volume 1&2. New York: Fitzroy Dearborn, 2004. Short essays and biographical information on important individuals who contributed to the Romantic movement.

Quiller-Couch, Arthur. The Oxford Book of English Verse: 1250–1900. ed 1919. http://www.bartleby.com/ A website dedicated to literature and poetry, focusing on easy reference for student use.

Rees, Ronald. "Constable, Turner, and Views of Nature in the Nineteenth Century" Geographical Review 72 no. 3 (July 1982): 253-269.
This journal article compares the work of the two major British landscape painters of the Romantic Era, John Constable and Joseph Turner, with the goal of understanding each artist's personal understanding of the natural world and its importance. It includes some black and white reproductions of each artist's major works, as well a detailed discussion of the historical and geographic context that Constable and Turner lived in and reacted to in their work.

Romanticism: http://wsu.edu:8080/~brians/hum_303/romanticism.html [accessed 10/20/2009] An overview of various Romanticism ideas including the themes of religion, individualism, emotion, and nature.

Romanticism: Introduction to Romanticism http://academic.brooklyn.cuny.edu/english/melani/cs6/rom.html [accessed 10/20/2009] A summary of Romantic terms and perceptions including historical considerations, imagination, nature, symbolism, and others.

Rousseau, Jean-Jacques. The Confessions and Correspondence, Including the Letters to Malesherbes. Edited by Christopher Kelly, Roger D. Masters, and Peter G. Stillman, Translated by Christopher Kelly. Hanover: University Press of New England, 1995.

Samuel Taylor Coleridge: Kubla Khan or, A Vision In a Dream: A Fragment (1816). http://www.wsu.edu:8080/~wldciv/world_civ_reader/world_civ_reader_2/coleridge.html [accessed 11/19/2009] A literary study of a portion of Kubla Khan.

Sharpe, Kevin, and Zwicker, Steven N. Refiguring Revolutions. Los Angeles, University of California Press, 1998. Speaks mainly on the arts, also tends to mainly cover England. Useful overview, but not terribly helpful. It does touch on the parallels to French society during the Revolution.

Silz, Walter. Early German Romanticism: Its Founders and Heinrich Von Kleist. Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1929. The monograph is an example of the the early stages in German Romanticism, especially involved with the Jena Circle and the work of Kleist. The precedents set by Goethe and Schiller are accounted for the opening chapters.

Smitherman, Daniel, “Owen Barfield. Romanticism Comes of Age and Speaker’s Meaning. The Barfield Press, 2007.” Rocky Mountain Review, Volume 62 Issue 1, (spring 2008): page 97-101. The article reviews the book by Barfield whose arguments include that the Romantics identified imagination as a trustworthy source of reality, but they could not describe how imagination was true.

Stromberg, Roland. European Intellectual History since 1789. New York: Meredith Corporation, 1968. An introduction to some of the greatest European academic minds including a focus on how they affected their own societies.

Talmon, J.L. Romanticism and Revolt: Europe 1815-1848. Harcourt Brace and World, Inc. 1967. An older work but very informative, covering exactly the subject I sought to address. Covers all of Europe, and provided good information on the formation of Germany and Italy.

Tieck, Ludwig. Der Blonde Eckbert. bearbeitet von Achim Seiffarth. Hamburg: Cideb Editrice, 2003. This primary source is an example of an early German Romantic novel. However, it is written in German and has been crafted for intermediate German courses, analyzing various themes typical of the romantic era that Tieck was familiar with. Tieck also used the term "waldeinsamkeit"or the "woodland solitude". He wrote "The Blond Eckbert" in 1803.

Turk, Eleanor L. The History of Germany. Westport, CN, Greenwood Press. 1999. A history limited only to Germany in the modern age, good information on the founding of modern Germany and influence of Prussia.

Weisner-Hanks, Merry E. Early Modern Europe, 1450-1789. New York, Cambridge University Press, 2006. A good modern text, though not as detailed as a more specific work. Gave a good overview of the subject, its bibliography was a effective starting point.

Ziolkowski, Theodore. German Romanticism and its Institutions. Princeton University Press, 1990. An excellent work explaining how Romanticism influenced German culture and arts, written in great detail including pieces of many primary sources.

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